U.S. Official: Transfer Pricing Enforcement Should Precede New Rules

Senior Editor

Governments should focus on enforcing laws already the books that govern the way large multinational companies move profits between high and low tax countries before writing new legislation, a U.S. Treasury tax official said Thursday.

But while legislators in many countries, including the U.S., are interested in changing the rules to keep more profits at home, any effort to do that should start with better enforcement, Robert Stack, Deputy Assistant Secretary for International Tax Affairs in the Office of Tax Policy at the U.S. Department of the Treasury, said at a global tax conference organized by advisory firm Taxand in New York on Thursday.

Nearly across the board, mid-market executives are hiring new employees, buying new technology solutions, acquiring businesses to reach new markets and preparing IPOs, according to a Deloitte survey of more than 500 mid-market executives. But companies are running up against a number of constraints as they seek to expand, particularly in acquiring and retaining skilled talent.